I am wanting to open an internet cafe once I complete school



My girlfriend will be leaving me when she goes to college so I figure why the hell not

Thats what I am thinking so far... I have about 2-3 more years till I even finish so its a while

I am wanting at least 20 computers... and 3 tvs with game consoles.

Do yall think that layout would be a decent start?

*Remember this is just ideas... I did this in 20 minutes at work

I'd go.

If it works out, it would definatly be something I think people would want to go to.

there are a few in new orleans, la that ive been to. They always full adn it kinda sucks lol no room for me. I wouldnt want it in a big city like that but theres a smaller city that is growing that I would like to do it as they do not have one YET heh

Will see. I dont think the building would be exactly like that... prob longer.. I have MANY ideas

My recommendation would be to start off with fewer PC's, to see how popular you become - and then you can reassess the situation at that time.

I agree completely. But that does look great!

The reason I bring that up, is if you fail - you'll have all these extra computers.

Especially with all the computers being a majority of the capital required to startup.

Secondly, if this does become a success - you'll need a lot more computers, but more importantly - a lot more space. So you'd have to move locations, and reorganize everything at that time anyway.

Nothing like Coffee n' Stuff

Speaking of Coffee n' Stuff, I'm wondering what the Tech Room is for...

The servers and hubs and all that good stuff?

Doesn't look bad, but personally I'd move the Inventory Closet into the Tech Room and have bigger bath rooms. Also you might want to think about a separate place for people to buy computer access rather than having to go to the Coffee 'n' Stuff bar.
Also I think 20 PCs a bit much to begin with, especially if your plan doesn't work out, go for a smaller number like 10 and see how you go from there, you can always get a bigger building and have everything more spread out but then it leaves you with space to expand into quickly.

Ian

52" TV's?

I imagine you don't need telling, but you'll need to work out your plan for getting your money back before embarking on anything.

20 PCs = -$20,000 or so
+ premises, power, furniture, tvs, coffee stocks etc...

And maybe more sitting-opportunities---

Here's a question: where do you imagine the door will be? Between the tech room and the bathroom, or opposite that, by the TVs?

Xbox and Ps2 on the same TV? Meaning pick one? I'd have Xbox on one, Ps2 on another, and for the third another one of those, a Gamecube, or something else. Ps3 and Xbox360 will be out soon...

What kind of PCs? My brother asked me about the cheapest PC I could have built, and it came out to $350 or so, just for a basic Sempron system with VERY limited gaming capabilities... as in it might play Diablo 2 and Warcraft 3, but nothing more advanced. And I built my gaming rig for $900 or so, but have so far put $1150 or so into it (including initial build costs). And that's all box-only, no software or monitor or peripherals.

If any are for Net access only, you could save yourself a lot of trouble and money by installing Linux on those. You'll need Windows XP (preferrably Home, it's cheaper and does 99% of what Pro does) for gaming and multimedia, but for people who just want to surf the Net or do homework, Linux is perfect.

I like the idea of cybercafes, but they tend to gouge for Internet access, just like they and regular coffeehouses gouge for coffee. It's like people tell me about bars... you're not paying those ridiculous prices for the beer/coffeee/net access, you're paying for the atmosphere. That said, you'll want to plan a good location, hopefully near a college or trade school, and have a really good atmosphere to put people in a mood to game and drink coffee.

Good luck with the project.

Yea 52" tvs They are beyond awesome to play games on. Better for tournaments also.

This may be nice as a goal, but you probably want to start out with something less ambitious and expand services from there. If you start out with this and your business bombs you'll end up owing a whole lot of debt. Might wanna start off with some cheap business Dells, and then work towards this if business picks up.

You definitly don't need an entire room that size for a switch and router...

As I said, you should start off with less. You could always get more...

Actually, to the contrary. You SHOULD get XP Pro, and not XP Home. Reason being? Well, it's not really that much more. But anyway, you should make everything all part of a domain. Having a domain, though - you'll have to have a domain controller. That gets a bit pricy though, but if you want to be professional - it's required.

Yes, in the startup phases - Dells would be perfect.

Dells would be good, but I would like the users to be able to play the "up to date" games. Dropping it down to 10 would be acceptable. The good thing about computers is if you don't do well, you could always sell them I forgot to mention the "tech room" would be for computer troubleshooting. I would like to do computer repair jobs on the side.

Dells can play "up to the date" games just fine...

Maybe to start off you could make it some budget ones, and some XPS. Internet Cafes are notoriously expensive to set up and run so you have to be careful not to dig yourself in too deep and have yourself caved over by debt.

Don't waste your money buying PCs. Lease them. That way you spread the costs out so there is no huge initial payout. And you will get brand new PCs every 2-3 years. This will also allow you to get much better spec'ed machines as you won't be using all your money at once. You will not find many companies that ever actually buy the computers they use.



There's no way you would want XP home on a network that size. You're gonna want all the machines on a domain which you can closely monitor the policies and update the whole network with a few clicks. As for cost... well. get a good deal and you'll be paying about $5-10 per copy of XP.

I'd also suggest separating the PC room from the XBox/PlayStation section. I know that while at college, the PC users playing CounterStrike absolutely HATED it when the XBox crowd was playing Halo with the same setup you have there (3 TVs, 3 XBox's). Each section was loud, but the PC users can at least use headphones. They don't really mix the sound quality very well...and PC users can get really annoyed at consolers rather quickly.

That's my only suggestion.

...or at least keep a wide door for the two so you could perhaps close it off when you have tournaments, but leave it open otherwise.

^^^

Thats what that thicker line is for It is meant to be a wall.. Sorry for not clarifying it more. I will work on it more this week at work.. I mean, Ican't really decide where each thing is going because I don't have exact measurements This is just a dream I am trying to turn into reality

That looks amazing. It's a really good idea. Hope it works out.

Yeah it does look amazing. I will have to come to it when it is bulit!

Its a cool idea - I wanted to do a similar thing at one point.

Just something to consider though, is that in general, Internet Cafes are loosing popularity:

- More people have Internet / Broadband
-A local Internet Cafe which was part of Virgin Megastores in newcastle, converted from a really really cool place, where you could do anything, logged on with smart cards, machines reghosted when u logged off, to a rubbish place where u can only use internet explorer (no other applications NONE) and u pay by voucher - an unmanned internet cafe)
-Libraries offer free internet (or at least here in the UK)

But I think its a good idea, there seems more market for internet cafe's which focus mainly on computer games, and LAN gaming

If you really want to do this, I'd imagine starting with a business plan rather than a floor plan would be a better start

He did say he still has 2-3 years still left at school and, these are ideas. Most people when they have business ideas, have an imaginative phase where they think Ill do this, and have a big office here, and this here and do that, then they think more seriously, and plan it properly, then if the plan is viable, they do it